When I lay down I can hear the guns
the grenades and the screams
but the weariness will wear them down
and all that's left is what I dream
my wife will try to hold me
when I'm shaking in the night
and she knows damn well I'm lying
when I tell her I'm alright
they called me a peacekeeper
in my snappy blue beret
the mission of a lifetime
I heard my insides say
Africa lay below me
like a woman with a smile
a lushness and a beauty
with the power to beguile
My name is Romeo Dallaire
I've seen the devil...this world we share
Rwanda is here when I'm not there
my name is Romeo Dallaire
But when the sky it exploded
and the hatred did touch down
I reached out for my mandate
and found it shredded on the ground
through a fax machine and phone line
New York they cut and ran
saying "as long as you don't draw your gun
you can do what you can"
I could stack all of the bodies
along the side of the UN
and they'd cover all the windows
where you pledged "never again"
Rwanda's heart is broken
and my soul is cut in two
one side still the peacemaker
what will the other do?
My name is Romeo Dallaire
I've seen the devil...this world we share
Rwanda is here when I'm not there
my name is Romeo Dallaire
It's been 10 years of forgetting
10 years to wonder why
10 years of revision
10 years to justify
10 years for the children
to find their way back home
10 years and my own head
still won't leave me alone
the grenades and the screams
but the weariness will wear them down
and all that's left is what I dream
my wife will try to hold me
when I'm shaking in the night
and she knows damn well I'm lying
when I tell her I'm alright
they called me a peacekeeper
in my snappy blue beret
the mission of a lifetime
I heard my insides say
Africa lay below me
like a woman with a smile
a lushness and a beauty
with the power to beguile
My name is Romeo Dallaire
I've seen the devil...this world we share
Rwanda is here when I'm not there
my name is Romeo Dallaire
But when the sky it exploded
and the hatred did touch down
I reached out for my mandate
and found it shredded on the ground
through a fax machine and phone line
New York they cut and ran
saying "as long as you don't draw your gun
you can do what you can"
I could stack all of the bodies
along the side of the UN
and they'd cover all the windows
where you pledged "never again"
Rwanda's heart is broken
and my soul is cut in two
one side still the peacemaker
what will the other do?
My name is Romeo Dallaire
I've seen the devil...this world we share
Rwanda is here when I'm not there
my name is Romeo Dallaire
It's been 10 years of forgetting
10 years to wonder why
10 years of revision
10 years to justify
10 years for the children
to find their way back home
10 years and my own head
still won't leave me alone
inviata da CCG/AWS Staff - 17/9/2007 - 21:23
×
![]()
© 2004 Tom Flannery and Lorne Clarke
a SongaWeek.com production
www.rwandasongs.com
Clarke & Flannery love to hear your thoughts on the song cycle. Email them to anthracite@rocketmail.com.
Truth is, there is no explanation for the Rwandan genocide. What there is in abundance, however, is ignorance. If these songs make just one person dig a little deeper, then we've made our money back, so to speak. We've touched upon specific pieces of the horror, but don't even pretend to be able to understand it from the Rwandan point of view. We're observers from afar. Interested, heartbroken observers....but merely observers nonetheless. Please keep that in mind.
All of these songs are solo acoustic performances...recorded live with a digital 8 track studio in Northeastern Pennsylvania. The full lyrics are available, as are the complete recordings in both mp3 and quicktime formats. Notes for each song are provided, giving some insight into the creative process....and explaining where explanations are necessary. The entire project is only available via the internet. There is no "official" CD of this music. This is strictly an "online" project.
This is partly due to economics, but also because once a CD is released, it can't be changed. We're likely to add new songs here at any time.
Individual essays are also posted, because some ideas that we have probably can't be conveyed using the song form alone. These too will probably grow in time. Also, a brand new play by playwright Tom Flannery called Rwandan Eyes is available exclusively here.
Everything here is free. Listen, distribute freely, discuss.
Do everything but steal.
Tom Flannery & Lorne Clarke.
ABOUT THE SONG
He has slowly pieced his life back together, writing and speaking of Rwanda all over the world. Free from the bounds of military restraint (he retired due to his illness), he is not shy about placing some of the blame where it belongs....that is, on those who consider black Africans somehow less deserving of life than white Europeans.
The West had few heroes in Rwanda during the Genocide. Here is one of them.